


Quotable

by ihatepeas



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Romance, olicity - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-26
Updated: 2014-05-30
Packaged: 2018-01-13 19:50:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 15,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1238770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ihatepeas/pseuds/ihatepeas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dialogue prompt one-shots. Each one will be added as a new chapter whenever I get inspired. Not related to my AU fic, Employee of the Month, but the bacon pajamas do make an appearance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You're Scaring Me

**Author's Note:**

> Saw a list of dialogue prompts and couldn't resist. Thanks to thatmasquedgirl, who encouraged me when I felt like scrapping this first one and starting over, or not posting at all. :P

Oliver hesitated outside her door. He wanted nothing more than to kick it down, but he could hear Felicity’s voice in his head, chiding him for doing anything that might call his cover identity into question. And she’d be furious with him for breaking her door. So he picked the lock. It was too easy, and they would definitely have a conversation about that later. For now, he just had to make sure she was all right.

It was a Sunday afternoon, nothing going on, but Diggle had been trying to reach her for hours, and when Oliver found out and began calling her too, worry blossomed into fear in his heart. It wasn’t like her to ignore their calls—she’d never done such a thing, even when she was angry.

The door swung inward, and he charged into Felicity’s apartment. While his gaze took in his surroundings, he pushed the information aside, focusing only on her. Or the lack of her. She wasn’t in the living room. He peered into the kitchen through a beaded curtain stretched across the doorway. It was miniscule, and she wasn’t there.

“Felicity, you’re scaring me,” he said, barely breathing as the knot of fear in his chest flared to pulsing life. His imagination was going wild, image after image rising up in his mind of all the awful things that could have happened to her.

The bathroom, also tiny—she’d griped more than once about having only a shower but no bathtub—was empty. One door left. It was closed, and he knew it was her bedroom. But he’d always been so careful with her, so careful not to cross the line he’d drawn, and the thought of entering her bedroom uninvited set off an alarm in the back of his mind.

Oliver stood there for a moment, his heart pounding, his pulse thrumming in his ears. Then a sound from the other side of the door erased all doubt. He twisted the knob and crossed the line.

The sound—it was a sob—had stopped. The room was dimly lit by a TV screen, which he ignored, focusing on the bed as he ran his hand along the wall, feeling for a switch. He flipped it on and the room was flooded with light.

The lump on the bed groaned.

Oliver blinked, his eyes adjusting to the sudden brightness. Teacups. They were everywhere, impossible not to notice. Teacups on every surface.

“Fel—”

The lump under the covers shrieked, and he heard the unmistakable crackle of a charging Taser.

“Felicity!”

She threw back the covers, and he barely had time to step out of the way before she fired the stun gun. The contacts bounced off the doorframe and hit the floor.

“Oliver?”

He stayed where he was, looking from the Taser clenched in her unwavering hand to her face. Her glasses were off, and she’d been crying. Her eyes were red and still wet.

“Oliver!” she cried. “What are you doing in my bedroom? Besides the obvious, I mean.” Her eyes widened. “Not that it’s obvious. Not that that thought has ever crossed your mind, which I’m sure it hasn’t . . . What was I saying?”

He smiled. Felicity’s rambling was one of the few things in life that made him genuinely smile. But for some reason, it tended to piss her off.

“Wipe that smirk off your face,” she said, hands on her hips. “It’s not funny.”

Maybe not, but his grin widened anyway. He couldn’t help it. Mostly it was relief at finding her relatively unscathed, but also it was just the scene before him. Felicity, sans glasses, her hair in a pile on top of her head. Felicity, kneeling on her bed, hands on hips—were those _bacon_ pajama pants?—clutching the Taser. Felicity, with unshed tears still in her eyes, shoulders bared by her pink tank top, against a backdrop of teacups. So many teacups.

“What’s with the teacups?” he asked.

“Oh, no. You don’t get to ask questions. You need to answer mine.”

“I’m not sure I can formulate an answer while you’re still pointing your Taser at me,” he said, struggling not to laugh.

She shrugged, tossing the stun gun onto the nightstand. “Like you’re afraid of me.”

“Not now,” he admitted, “but I definitely was when you were about to electrocute me.”

“Sorry about that,” Felicity mumbled. She sat back on her heels. “But you still haven’t answered. What are you doing here? I know we’re partners and everything, but partners don’t routinely waltz into other partners’ apartments, especially not early on Sunday mornings.”

“Early?” He frowned. “It’s mid-afternoon. How long have you been in here?”

She squinted at the clock. “All day, I guess.”

“Why haven’t you answered Dig’s and my calls? You never do that. I was really worried.”

“I know,” she replied. “You bellowed my name when I almost Tased you. It’s like your voice has only two settings, bellow and growl. And almost-whisper. And your Arrow voice, but that’s electronically synthesized, and—”

“Felicity.”

Her eyes closed briefly when he said her name. She did that a lot.

“You know why I’m here now, so answer my questions,” he continued. “Why aren’t you answering your phone? Why have you been crying? And most importantly, what’s with the teacups?”

She smiled, reaching into her pocket. (Definitely bacon pajama pants.) She withdrew a tissue and blew her nose, then settled her glasses on her face.

“My grandma gave them to me,” she said. “Well, some of them. She moved into assisted living and couldn’t take them all with her, and she worried about them getting broken. So I took them, and there were enough that people assumed I was collecting them, so I started getting teacups for birthdays and Hanukkah, and now they’ve just kind of grown on me.” She narrowed her eyes. “But I don’t want teacups for birthdays or Hanukkah, in case you were getting any ideas. . . . Not that you were getting ideas. Oh God, I’m not asking for presents, really!” She sighed, blushing bright red. “I have a headache.”

Forgetting everything he’d thought earlier about lines that shouldn’t be crossed, Oliver sat on the edge of the bed. “That answers the teacup question,” he said. “What about the rest?”

Felicity sighed again. “I never answer my phone when I’m watching _Lord of the Rings_ ,” she said. “I’m sure I've mentioned that to Dig at least once. I say everything else out loud.”

“ _Lord of the Rings_?” he asked. “All day?”

She shrugged. “Well, I was just going to watch _Fellowship_ , but the way it ends, with Frodo pulling Sam out of the water, and when he says, ‘I’m glad you’re with me.’” She swiped at the tears leaking from her eyes. “So I had to at least start _Two Towers_ , and then the way that one ends . . . I don’t know how people survived before _Return of the King_ came out, and I usually start bawling about halfway through that one, so . . .” She peered up at him. “I know I’m a huge nerd. I accept it. It’s just—it’s kind of a spiritual experience for me. I don’t expect you to understand.”

“I want to understand,” he almost-whispered. “Help me understand.”

Another sigh. “All right, but no talking,” she said, digging in the blankets and coming up with a remote. “Well, I guess you can talk because I can’t keep my mouth shut, but no sarcastic comments.”

“Never,” Oliver said.

Felicity unpaused the TV, and the movie continued. Oliver had seen the movies (and read the books more than once), but he stayed silent and sat there, perched on the edge of her bed, as Denethor urged Pippin to sing. In no time Felicity was crying again. He lifted his arm, and she dipped under it, burrowing in and sniffling. When she mumbled something about platonic circumstances, he just smiled and pulled her in closer.


	2. I'd Rather Die

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity confesses to a phobia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Um. A little weird, yeah. But hey, whatever. I thought I'd give you guys a little present since I haven't been able to update Employee of the Month yet.

Nerves of steel. He'd thought it of her more than once. Felicity was calm and collected when it mattered. So when Roy had called to say he'd found her cowering in the alley behind Verdant, Oliver didn't know what to think. Could Roy have mistaken someone else for Felicity? No. The kid was an idiot sometimes, but he wasn't that dumb.

Oliver had been on his way to the mansion to catch a few hours' sleep in an actual bed while he knew his mother would be out. But when Roy called, he had Diggle turn the car around. On hearing Felicity's name, Diggle had floored it. He'd driven the car into the alley, and they both got out.

She was cowering, just as Roy said, next to the Dumpster. She was still in her work clothes, but they were muddy and wet.

"Felicity," he said.

She closed her eyes briefly and shook her head.

Diggle looked over at Roy, who stood a good fifteen feet away. "What happened, man?"

Roy shrugged. "I came out with some trash, and she was on the ground over there." He vaguely indicated an area behind them. "She was sitting up, but she looked hurt. I said I'd call 911, and then she totally flipped. She jumped up and hid by the Dumpster, and when I came toward her, she said if I called 911, she'd start screaming and she wouldn't stop."

"So you didn't do anything," Oliver said, jaw clenched.

"Hey, man, I called you," Roy said. "I have a record. If cops or EMTs showed up and found an injured woman who screamed whenever I went near her . . ."

"You did the right thing," said Dig.

Roy ducked his head and went back into the building.

"I'll get the first-aid kit out of the car." Diggle got up, leaving Oliver alone with Felicity as terrified as he'd ever seen her.

He reached out his hand, but she drew her legs up. One of her shoes had a broken heel, and a red mark on her knee was already darkening into a bruise. He was ready to put an arrow in someone.

"Tell me what happened." He couldn't keep the growl out of his voice, but it wasn't aimed at her.

Felicity shook her head violently, then winced. "I know what you're thinking, but it's not going to happen," she said. "I'd rather die."

"You don't know what I'm thinking."

"You're thinking you want me to go to the hospital, but I won't. I'll scream and scream like I told Roy—" Her eyes narrowed. "Actually, you look like you want to put an arrow in somebody."

"I was thinking about it," he said, fingers flexing.

Felicity frowned. "There's no one to—oh, Oliver, no one did this to me! I did it myself."

"You wouldn't lie." It wasn't a question.

"I would never. Not with you." She was the one to bridge the gap between them, laying her hand on his clenched fist. "Besides, you know I'm a terrible liar."

Oliver opened his fist and took her hand in his. "Then tell me what happened, and then we'll talk about this 'I'd rather die' business."

She sighed, staring down at their intertwined fingers. "It was stupid. I'd gotten a ping off that search I left running, so I really wanted to get downstairs, and I was hurrying across that patch of ice that probably won't melt until June because it's always in the shade. And I slipped, and my stupid heel broke, and I fell really hard. I think I _bounced_ , Oliver."

Dig returned with the first-aid kit but wisely kept his distance.

"Why didn't you let Roy help you?" Oliver asked.

"Because he didn't want to _help_ me. He wanted to call 911. I barely stopped him in time."

"What's wrong with 911?" asked Dig.

"911 means hospitals and doctors and the E.R.," Felicity said. She'd begun to shiver. "It means nurses cutting off my clothes and changing me into a hospital gown. It means being _naked_. In front of _strangers_. Without my _permission_."

Oliver had no idea what to say to that. He'd have laughed, but the fear in her eyes was absolutely sincere. He stared down at their clasped hands too and waited for her to continue.

"It's a full-blown phobia," she explained, pushing up her glasses. "I broke my leg when I was seven, and when they cut my pants off, I totally freaked out. I had to be sedated."

"Felicity—"

"No hospital," she said. "I'm up and talking. I'm fine. Just help me up, and I'll be fine."

He reached out his other hand.

"I mean it," Felicity said. "I will scream."

"No hospital," Oliver said. "I promise." With both her hands in his, he drew her up with him.

"Oh, my head." She let go of his hand and touched the back of her head. Her fingers came away bloody. " _Oh_."

Her knees buckled, and in one swift move he scooped her into his arms and carried her to the car.

"You promised," she mumbled into his neck. "And you don't break your promises."

"Not ever," he whispered. "Not to you."


	3. Are Those Wedding Bells I Hear?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity continues her drug-addled ramble.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The original prompt said "detect" instead of "hear," but who talks like that? I don't even talk like that. Anyway, when I looked at this prompt last night, I started hearing all the dialogue in my head. I could hardly write fast enough to get it all down. Kind of a missing scene from 2x14 right after Felicity gets stitched up. It's my shortest one yet, but it might be my favorite. I mean, who doesn't love painkillers!Felicity?

Sara had gone upstairs to her new job tending Verdant's bar. Oliver was changing out of his hood and leather. That left Diggle with a very loopy Felicity, still humming and rubbing her cheek against the collar of her borrowed shirt. She swayed on the table, and he was afraid she'd fall off.

"Why don't you hop down and sit in your chair for a minute?" Dig suggested.

She rolled her head to one side, looking up at him. "Because I don't really want to do a faceplant on a concrete floor."

He helped her down from the table and guided her to the chair at her workstation. Felicity plopped down and spun to face the bank of charred monitors.

"You poor things," she mumbled, petting the screen in front of her. "I'm a terrible mother. I'm going to replace you with new children." Then she turned to pat the one unscathed CPU. "But not you, S.B. You're irreplaceable."

"S.B.?" Diggle asked.

"Sexy Beast," Felicity informed him, trailing a wavering finger along the casing.

"Are those wedding bells I hear? Or do you and S.B. just need a moment alone?"

Felicity turned around to face him. "We've already had our moment today. S.B. helped me find Tockman." She pushed against the floor with her heels, and the chair spun lazily. "Do you ship it, Dig?" she asked. "Me and computers?"

"Do I _what_?" He tossed the leftover scraps of gauze in the trash and came over to stand in front of her.

"Do you ship it? Are you emotionally invested in my relationship with the Sexy Beast?"

"I am not emotionally invested in your relationship with your creepily named computer," Diggle replied.

"Then what do you ship?" she asked, spinning slower.

She'd gone pale, and he wondered if she had any idea that she was making her "hack face." He drew the trash can closer.

"Everyone ships something," Felicity went on. "Me and peppermint mochas? I ship it. Me and expensive red wine? I ship it. Me and Ben & Jerry's, I ship them hard. _It_ , I mean, not them. Not Ben _and_ Jerry." She paused, looking thoughtful. "Although . . ."

Dig took her good arm and pulled her to her feet. "I think it's time for you to go home and get some rest," he said.

She tottered on her heels, leaning heavily on him. "Me and sleep, I ship that. I ship that like I ship . . . Oliver and the salmon ladder. Oliver and green leather."

He chuckled as he guided her up the stairs, listening to her continue to ramble.

"Oliver and that thing he does with his hand, you know, when he's anxious." Felicity demonstrated, flexing her fingers. Then her face brightened. "Oliver and shirtlessness, Dig. Don't you ship Oliver and shirtlessness?"

"I ship me and shirtlessness," Dig said. "Have you seen my arms?"

She laughed, then laid her head against his shoulder as he entered the code to unlock the door.

"No one ships me," Felicity said, her tone more melancholy now but still very medicated. "There's nobody to ship me with. Sexy Beast doesn't count—he has no arms."

The door clicked, and Dig pushed it open. The muffled thump of dance music filtered in from the club. He managed to get Felicity to the car without running into anyone they knew. He settled her in the front seat, where he could keep an eye on her, and buckled her in. When he got behind the wheel and started the engine, he glanced over at her. Some color had returned to her cheeks, and she was looking pretty drowsy now. She'd gone back to rubbing her nose against her good shoulder. She was smelling the shirt. Oliver's shirt. He placed his hand over hers for a moment.

"I ship you and happiness, Felicity," he said.

She looked at him over the top of her glasses. "Awwww. I ship you and awesome, Dig. It's my O . . . T . . . P . . ." Each letter was punctuated by a massive, jaw-popping yawn. She was asleep before he turned onto the highway.


	4. I'm Not Going to Make It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity is beholden to Oliver.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to do something different than the standard, which is usually to have the line spoken by someone who's mortally wounded. Really, this line is almost as ubiquitous as "Don't die on me!" :P Anyway, I hope you like what I've done with it.

"I'm not going to make it."

Felicity's arms burned, holding her entire body weight as she hung from the bar on the bottom rung of the salmon ladder. Dig was supposed to be spotting her, but he was just standing off to the side, huge arms crossed, smiling that annoying "I know things" smile.

"Just remember that this was your idea," he said.

"How could I forget? You've said it three times since I've been hanging here."

She'd done a few experimental pull-ups, but she hadn't been able to move the bar, and now she couldn't move at all. Any minute now, she'd lose her grip.

"You know, I should have through this through a little more," she said. "Who uses this thing? I didn't even know what a salmon ladder was until I met you and Oliver. You never use it. Sara did that one time, but she had a lot to process. Only Oliver does this regularly."

"And you know the man isn't right in the head," said Dig.

Felicity snickered, swinging a little, but when she saw Oliver coming down the steps, she clamped her mouth shut. Crap. She'd hoped to have gotten down before he showed up. How was she going to get down? She was shorter than him—it would be a longer drop. Onto a concrete floor.

"Is this what you two do when I'm not here?" Oliver asked. "Hang around on my training equipment and trash-talk about me?"

"The hanging part is new," Felicity said. "And I'm pretty sure I'm never going to do it again. I don't know what I was thinking. I sort of imagined it would be like the uneven bars, but it was a dumb idea anyway. I got kicked out of gymnastics when I was seven."

Oliver's half-smile was replaced by a confused frown. "It seems like a lot happened to you when you were seven."

"It was a busy year," Felicity replied. "Now are you two going to help me down, or are you going to leave me hanging here and walk away like we're in some stupid movie?"

"Felicity, you're not even three feet off the ground," Dig said.

"That's not the point," she insisted. "It's a concrete floor. I could crack my head open."

Oliver tilted his head. The half-smile was back. "If I help you down," he said, "would you do something for me?"

"Anything." It came out sounding more desperate than she'd meant it to, but she was desperate. Her hands were slipping.

Oliver's half-smile widened into a full one as he took two steps forward to stand in front of her. When he placed his hands on her hips, she was so surprised that she let go of the bar. Which had probably been his plan all along, since he caught her easily and then set her down. His eyes betrayed nothing, but she kind of thought his hands lingered a second or two longer on her hips than Dig's might have.

"You're on the hook now," Dig said to her. He was smiling too, the _I know things_ one. "All he did was set you down, and now you're at his mercy."

Oliver winked at her. _Damn_. That always made her blush furiously and caused her stomach to flip.

"Oliver," she said slowly. His name felt like a secret on her tongue. "Ben Parker once said, 'With great power comes great responsibility.' Something to keep in mind while you're mulling over the possibilities." She wiped her sweaty palms on her snazzy workout pants, afraid to look him in the eye. Her legs were already wobbly—she couldn't take another wink. She risked a glance anyway.

Oh God. He was making the billionaire pouty face, the one that made her want to slap him. Or kiss him. She wasn't always sure which, and it was confusing.

"Will you bake me some cookies?"

Felicity burst out laughing. "You have these magic hands completely at your disposal, and you want cookies?" Her laughter abruptly cut off. "That did not sound dirty in my head, I swear. I just meant 'magic hands' as in computer hands, not sexy times hands."

"Thanks for clearing that up," Dig said drily.

"Cookies, Oliver? Really?"

He put his hands in his pockets. "Dig mentioned the ones you made for him when I was . . . gone. He made them sound amazing, and I just—"

The pout was gone, replaced by a sadness in his eyes that took hold of her heart and squeezed. Whatever he was thinking, whether it was about all he'd lost at home or all he'd lost on the island, he was miles and miles away from her.

"All right, if that's all you want," Felicity said with a loud sigh meant to draw him back to the present. "They _are_ amazing cookies."

"Now?" Oliver was smiling again, the sadness pushed back down to wherever he kept everything else he felt but didn't know how to express.

"Now," she repeated. "You want me to bake you cookies now?"

He shrugged. "You have the night off. I'll help. I could run to the store for whatever you need. I could stir."

She smiled at that, but then she remembered something. "You can't, Oliver. You have that fundraiser thing for your mom's campaign. In fact . . ." Her eyes narrowed. "Shouldn't you be there right now?"

"I already called," said Oliver. He grinned, and it almost took her breath away. He had teeth, perfect bright billionaire teeth. His entire face lit up. "I said I'm not going to make it."


	5. You're Bleeding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Picks up right after "I'm not going to make it." Olicity cookie-baking by request from people whose names I can't remember.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a beast. It was not meant to be this long, and I even cut some things. By the time I got to the actual cookie-baking, I was so ready to be done, so I apologize if the end seems rushed. Ugh. I don't know what else to say except that I'm so glad I've finished and can move on to something else. :P

**You’re Bleeding**

When Oliver said now, he meant now. And she’d promised. Which was how Felicity found herself pushing a cart down the baking aisle of the grocery store on a Sunday afternoon, still in her workout clothes. Oliver trailed along behind her, seeming ill at ease. But then he probably had very limited experience with grocery stores, growing up in a home with cooks and maids and drivers.

She steered the cart to the checkout with the shortest line, but of course it was the line containing a little old lady writing out a check with a trembling hand, and a man with a full shopping cart who divided all his stuff into four separate transactions. Felicity couldn’t hold back an impatient sigh. Oliver was just staring into the cart.

“You really need all this just to bake cookies?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I wasn’t sure what I had at home, so I got everything. I don’t want to have to come back here because I forgot I was out of eggs or something.”

“I know I’m pretty clueless when it comes to this stuff,” he said, waving his hand over the cart, “but I’ve watched Raisa bake enough times to know that butterscotch pudding cups aren’t typical cookie ingredients.” He tilted his head and smiled at her.

“Those are for me, not the cookies,” she explained. “I’ve been craving them. Well, not actually craving them in the sense that I’ve been pining for days. But when I saw them, my mouth started watering.”

“And the egg rolls?” he asked.

“Trust me, we’re going to need a snack. These are labor-intensive cookies.”

“And all the Diet Coke—”

“—is for me too, okay?” She rolled her eyes so hard that they hurt. “I could’ve gotten wine, but I’ve drunk-cookie-baked before, and it’s not pretty.”

“‘Drunk-cookie-baked’?” he repeated, arching an eyebrow.

“Yeah, you know, like drunk-dialing.” Felicity pushed the cart forward and began setting items on the conveyor belt. “Only you make a huge mess and burn stuff instead of leaving your exes long, incoherent voice-mails.”

Once they’d checked out, Oliver pushed the cart out to her car. She unlocked it, and he looked in the miniscule back seat.

“Good to see the bloodstains are gone,” he said.

“Well, I was just going to leave them, but the flies they attracted were kind of a driving hazard.”

He grinned at her, and she almost dropped the bag in her hands. Felicity could count on one hand the times she’d seen him smile widely enough to show his teeth.

The drive home was short, but awkward silences were the worst. Her tongue itched to flap and flap about all manner of nonsense just to fill in the quiet, but the more nervous she was, the more inappropriate her rambles would get. So she gritted her teeth and kept a tight grip on the wheel, pretending she was driving through a snowstorm that took all her concentration.

When they reached her apartment building and—miracle of miracles—found a decent parking place, Oliver finally spoke.

“Are you a nervous driver?” he asked.

“What? No.” But her white-knuckled grip belied her words. She let go of the wheel and flexed her stiff fingers.

Oliver had never been in her apartment officially, but she was pretty sure he’d visited twice to check on her, the night he’d killed the Count to save her, and the night she’d been shot by Tockman. He faked it pretty well, though, glancing around as if he’d never seen the place. Felicity was neat, so she didn’t have to worry about bras hanging from door knobs or a sink full of dirty dishes. Her place was tiny, and between her two jobs she wasn’t usually home long enough to mess it up.

“This is going to be interesting,” she mused.

“How so?” He was holding all the bags but one, and his muscles weren’t even straining with the effort.

“My kitchen is really small and narrow. And I’m on the small side, so it works for me. You, on the other hand, are not even remotely small.”

“You think we won’t fit?” Oliver peeked through the green beaded curtain strung across the kitchen doorway. “I think we’ll fit.”

She pushed the curtain aside to allow him to enter the kitchen first. Oliver set the bags on the counter, and she added the one she’d been carrying.

“Okay,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “Tell me where everything goes.”

“I can put away my own groceries,” she said.

“You’re tired. I’ll do it. Just point me in the right direction.”

So Felicity guided him like she had in the grocery store, pointing to cupboards and shelves in the fridge. He also preheated the oven for the egg rolls and retrieved her recipe book from the top of the fridge.

“I could get used to bossing you around,” she said. Instantly mortified, she opened her mouth to do damage control, but he cut her off.

“It’s only fair, since I boss you around all day and most of the night,” he said. “Sweet and sour sauce?” He held up the packets included with the frozen egg rolls. The contents were slushy and pale orange.

“Gross. No,” Felicity replied, “I usually make my own. It won’t take long.”

She figured he could handle the microwave, so while she made the sauce and set it to simmer, he softened the butter for the icing in stages. Seeing Oliver make himself at home in her kitchen was weird in the sense that it was totally natural when it shouldn’t be. With one she stirred the sauce, and with the other she reached for her phone and turned on her iTunes. She had a carefully crafted cooking playlist that she was pretty sure didn’t have anything too embarrassing on it.

Felicity wasn’t kidding when she said the cookies were labor-intensive. She and Oliver ate all the egg rolls while they baked a double batch, sliding tray after tray in and out of the oven. The kitchen was hot, even with the window thrown wide open, and it could have gotten all awkward and sweaty, but they managed to dance around each other in the narrow space, so it was just sweaty. They didn’t talk much, and it didn’t feel strange. Just questions and instructions.

As the last tray of cookies cooled, Felicity grabbed a can of Diet Coke from the fridge and showed Oliver how to mix the icing. It drove him crazy that she didn’t use measurements for this part, and he wanted to know how she learned to do it and how she could just bake by instinct without making any mistakes, but she could explain none of those things to his satisfaction.

When Oliver grabbed a whisk from the drawer, she kept her mouth shut. She thought whisks were a huge pain, and she wasn’t even sure why she still had one. Whisks were for restaurant chefs and Daleks. Hers was old, and the handle was broken. It had probably come from her mother’s house. But he was trying to help, and she could just make him clean it later.

He attacked the bowl of powdered sugar, melted butter, and vanilla. Obviously he’d really been looking forward to the stirring part. A smile crept slowly across her face as she shamelessly ogled the play of muscles in his arms. He glanced over his shoulder and grinned as he caught her staring. Her smile was replaced by a flush of crimson, and she took a big swallow of her Diet Coke, choking a little.

“Um.” She rose up on her toes and tried to look over his shoulder. “Maybe you don’t need to stir so vigorously?”

“Just trying to get this stupid white crap to mix in,” he grumbled.

“Powdered sugar.”

Felicity bumped her hip into his, moving him aside a little so she could inspect the bowl. To her surprise, there was something . . . red. A red dot marring the creamy surface of the frosting, which looked as if it was the perfect consistency. She looked over at Oliver, who was holding the whisk in a death grip, like it was a weapon or maybe the throat of someone who’d really pissed him off.

“Are you—Oliver, you’re bleeding,” she said, peeling his fingers back from the whisk. A drop of blood hit the tile floor, and blood coated the whisk’s broken handle.

“I ruined the frosting.” He almost sounded as if he was going to cry. “Do we have to start over?”

“You’re bleeding, and that’s what you’re worried about?” She shook her head. “Come here.” She pulled him over to the sink and ran his cut finger under a stream of cold water. Paper towels stemmed the bleeding, and he held them in place over the wound while she threw away the broken whisk and went to the bathroom to look for bandages.

Every inch of counter space was covered with cooling cookies, remnants of their egg roll dinner, and dirty utensils. Felicity shoved the frosting bowl to one side and made Oliver rest his hand on the counter, palm up, so she could apply antiseptic.

“My hands shake a little bit,” she explained. “It’s easier for me when I don’t have to worry about a moving target.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Felicity’s Fun Fact of the Day.” She applied the bandage, wincing a little as she pressed down on the cut. “They’re Wonder Woman bandages, sorry. They’re all I have.”

“It’s just a little cut,” he said, his fingers briefly curling around hers. “I’m more worried about the frosting.”

Felicity looked in the bowl. It was a very tiny drop of blood, and it was just on the surface. She used a spoon to scoop it and the frosting around it out of the bowl. She dropped the spoon in the sink and quickly ran some hot water over it. Staring at and thinking about blood was starting to make her legs wobbly. Or maybe it was the heat.

“Stupid whisk,” she muttered. Her legs did give way then, but Oliver caught her. He tightened his grip on her waist and set her up on the counter she’d just cleared.

“Lean over and put your head down,” he said.

So Felicity sat on the counter feeling ridiculous bent double and trying not to slide off while Oliver threw out the contaminated icing, started over, and then frosted every last cookie.

“When I said this was going to be a lot of work, I didn’t plan for you to do almost all of it, really,” she said, sitting up. It was probably too soon to hop down from the counter, so she just leaned her head back against the cabinet behind her and closed her eyes.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Oliver said.

When he squeezed her shoulder, she opened her eyes to find him standing in front of her, holding out a frosted cookie, his blue eyes sparkling.

“I’m starting to think it’ll be worth the wait.”


	6. Promise Me You'll Never Do That Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity finds herself in an uncomfortable situation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had no idea this would end up as long as it did. It just came out so easily. Anyway, this was the result of a conversation between me and thatmasquedgirl, which culminated in me saying I could put shirtless Oliver, suspenders Oliver, and crying Oliver all in the same one-shot. :P That it actually fit into one of my dialogue prompts was a bonus.

**Promise Me You'll Never Do That Again**

Felicity pulled at the zip ties pinning her wrists together, but they were too tight, and any movement seemed to make them tighter. They were cutting into her skin. She slumped against the interior of the van.

The evening had started out okay. She’d actually eaten a well-balanced meal instead of burgers and fries from Big Belly. And she eaten at the table across from the training mats while Dig and Oliver worked out, so she had mealtime entertainment and eye candy. Not that the change in cuisine stopped Oliver from stealing a bite or two off her plate. And of course he went for the good stuff, ignoring the pale slice of tomato she’d picked off her sandwich. She’d slapped his hand, but he just popped the bite of chicken salad in his mouth and smiled.

“Go put a shirt on,” she’d grumbled.

His smile widened into a grin and he backed away from her, holding up his hands. He turned and headed up the stairs, probably to get ready for that charity gala that had been on his calendar for months. Every time Felicity brought it up, he griped about it and then changed the subject. So she’d had to make all the arrangements herself, even roping Thea into procuring Oliver’s tux and bringing it to the office so Felicity could have it dry-cleaned. She was afraid she’d have to force him into the garments, with the way he’d been acting, but tonight he seemed capable of dressing himself. He might have even been in a good mood, but it was hard to tell with Oliver sometimes.

Felicity started a search on one of her monitors while Dig gulped down a ton of water and devoured the turkey avocado sandwich she’d gotten him.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked after a while.

“Oliver. Where does he shower?” She ignored Diggle’s raised eyebrows. Not _everything_ that came out of her mouth was an innuendo.

“I mean, I know I don’t spend as much time down here now that Oliver and Sara are basically living here. Together. But I know it better than anyone. I redesigned it myself, and I know—” She waved her hand, and the pen she’d been holding flew over her shoulder. “I know there’s no shower here.” She got up and walked around her workstation, looking for her pen. “There’s no shower in this whole building. So where does he go?”

“Felicity, I spend exactly zero percent of my time thinking about Oliver in the shower,” Dig said.

“That is the correct answer,” said a voice almost deep enough to dip into the Arrow register.

Felicity peeked over the back of the monitor. Oliver was coming down the steps two at a time. His hair was still damp and sticking up everywhere, and he held his jacket thrown over his shoulder by one hooked finger. And he was wearing suspenders. Her night really was improving.

He’d caught her staring then, and she ducked behind the monitor, forgetting for a moment why she was back there. She took a step to the side, but her heel caught a looped cord, and she went down.

It didn’t seem possible for Oliver to cross the distance between them as fast as he did, but somehow he was there and drawing her to her feet. Without thinking, she used his suspenders to pull herself up, and she was still holding onto them when he cleared his throat. She quickly stepped backward. Her heel caught again, and Oliver grasped her elbows and pulled her toward him. She stepped right out of her shoes.

“What are you doing back here, anyway?” he asked.

“M-my pen,” she stuttered.

Oliver crouched and plucked the pen from a nest of cords. It was a tangled mess she’d have to do something about eventually, but—

“Your suspenders are totally distracting,” Felicity mumbled.

“What?” He stood up and held out the pen.

“Nothing.” She took it and tucked it behind her ear. “Thanks.”

“Maybe you should leave the heavy lifting to those of us who don’t wear heels.”

Felicity reached up for her pen and flung it at him. It bounced off his chest and skittered across the floor. But the pen had been uncapped, and now Oliver’s snowy tux shirt was marred by a streak of blue ink. He looked down at it.

“Wow,” she said. “Oops. Maybe you should leave your jacket buttoned all night.”

His lips quirked up. “Maybe you should use your words instead of throwing stuff at me.”

Felicity didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of using her words, and now there was nothing left to throw in arm’s reach. So she settled for returning to her chair.

“I can Google ink stains,” she said.

“No time,” said Oliver. “I have another shirt somewhere.”

He pulled the suspenders off his shoulders and started unbuttoning his shirt. Had Hanukkah come early? In all his shirtless glory, he strode across her field of vision, suspenders hanging from his hips. It kind of reminded her of the July picture on the sexy-fireman-of-the-month calendar that had most certainly _not_ been on her fridge until very recently, when Dig had started making frequent visits to check up on her while Slade was on the loose.

Only now, as she lay tied up inside a creep’s van, did she remember the little smirk on Oliver’s face as he took the long way around the room to get to the duffel bag where he kept his clothes. Jerk.

Felicity yanked at the zip ties again. The van hit a bump, and she tumbled onto her side, hissing as the plastic ties cut her skin. She could feel the blood running down her arm.

“I should have known it was too good to be true,” she said to herself. “Shirtless Oliver, suspenders Oliver, flagrantly shirtless Oliver, delicious suspenders Oliver for one brief minute, and then . . . BAM. Knocked out by some faceless creep on the way to my car.”

She couldn’t remember much from the time Oliver left for the gala until she’d awoken tied up in this fan. Felicity was sure it was because she’d been drugged, a theory backed up by her dry mouth and throbbing head. The driver took a hard right, and she rolled across the floor, slamming headfirst into the other side.

“Ow. Hurry up, boys.”

Felicity had no doubt her boys would come for her. She just didn’t know how long it would take them to realize she was gone, and by then it might be too late.

The van lurched. It felt like the driver was swerving violently from side to side.

“I’m getting tossed around like a rag doll in here,” she said. “Which is dumb, now that I think about it, because what kid even owns a rag doll anymore? Not when there are Barbies and Bratz and Disney princesses and Amercian Girl. But not me. I just had Cleo the stuffed donkey, and I’d whisper to him, ‘You are an ass—’”

The van hit something then, hard. Felicity was thrown forward and then back, hitting her head hard enough to lose consciousness. The shock of cold air hitting her face brought her around. She saw her captor’s face now as he dragged her out of the van by her bound wrists and ankles. Blood dripped down his cheek from a fresh cut. Felicity gasped when she realized he wouldn’t have let her see him if he didn’t plan to kill her.

Before she’d even begun to process that thought, the man lifted her effortlessly and threw her. _Threw_ her. Cold night air rushed into her open mouth. She gasped and choked, twisting futilely against her bonds, blinded by the darkness and the loss of her glasses somewhere along the way.

Water. She heard the sound of it just before she hit the surface. It felt as if a giant wet hand had slapped her with all its might. Then she panicked. Arching and bucking in the water, she tugged at her bonds, ignoring the pain as the zip ties and her own nails tore at her skin. Bobbing on the surface for a moment, she opened her mouth to scream, but a current pulled her under and she got a mouthful of water instead.

It was cold. The kind of cold that even she couldn’t find enough words to describe. Her hands were already numb, fingers scrabbling clumsily now at the ties around her ankles. The darkness was absolute, not even the smallest shimmer of light to tell her which direction to kick toward the surface.

So, so cold. But Felicity was pissed now. She wasn’t going down without a fight. She kicked and writhed and bucked like a mermaid having a seizure. But her lungs burned, and contrary to everything she knew, she couldn’t stop her mouth from opening to draw in a breath.

Cold, brackish water poured down her throat and windpipe. She gasped and coughed, but she was underwater, so it only invited more water in.

To her, there was no transition from drowning to rescue. She didn’t feel strong arms surrounding her, or the rush of wind as her head broke the surface. It was just blackness to blackness, and she didn’t know she was out of the water until she was coughing up half the lake onto Oliver’s lap.

Oliver?

She tried to say his name, but it only made her cough harder. Once she caught her breath, she looked up at him. All his walls were down, the many masks cast aside, his dark blue eyes filled with tears. Her hand reached up to cup his jaw, and she glared at it as if it had moved of its own accord. His eyes closed and the tears spilled over. Oliver drew her close and rested his chin on her forehead.

“Promise,” he said, his voice rough as if he’d been shouting. “Promise you’ll never do that again.”

“What? Get snatched by some psycho and hurled into the water?”

“No.”

She pulled back so she could see his face. The traitor hand that had slipped around the back of his neck came down, and her fingers gently brushed away the tears on his cheek.

“Never throw your pen at me gain,” he said solemnly.

Felicity choked out a laugh, and his arms tightened around her. She was soaked and freezing, but she barely felt it as her arms slid around his torso to return the hug.

“Ooo, the suspenders are still here,” she mumbled as her fingers brushed past them. “My night keeps getting better and better.”


	7. Do You Hear Yourself?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity meets Helena.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been wanting to write this scene for a while. In honor of Helena's reappearance last night.

**Do You Hear Yourself? –missing scene 1x17**

 

“Hi. I don’t think we had the chance to be properly introduced this morning.”

Felicity lowered the receiver of her desk phone and looked up. The crossbow she’d just told Oliver’s voice-mail about was now leveled at her heart, wielded by Helena Bertinelli in her whole Huntress getup. It seemed a little silly since everyone—well, she and Oliver and Dig—knew who she was, but I.T. had security cameras just like every other department at Queen Consolidated.

“What do you want?” Felicity asked slowly, trying to keep the nervous tremor in her voice to a minimum.

“I think you know,” said the crazy masked woman. “You seemed pretty enthusiastic about this morning, before Oliver shut you down. Very rude of him, by the way.”

“You want me to hack the FBI?” Felicity carefully set the receiver on her desk without actually hanging up the phone. Hopefully it would pick up their conversation until Oliver’s voice-mail cut off. At least he would know where she was and what was going on with Helena.

“I need an address for where Daddy dearest is being held,” said Helena. “Get to work.”

Felicity sat down and turned toward her computer. Helena tossed her dark hair over her shoulder and came around the desk so she could see what Felicity was doing.

Helena spotted the phone off its hook. “Naughty, naughty,” she chided, replacing the receiver on the base.

Felicity really didn’t like the idea of using her work computer to commit a federal crime, but with Helena’s crossbow still aimed at her heart, she didn’t have much of a choice. She’d spent a lot of time thinking about how she’d go about sneaking into the FBI’s secure database, so actually implementing the steps was quick work. She mumbled something that had Helena leaning in a little closer.

“What was that, Blondie?”

“I like your coat,” Felicity said. “I have a purple coat too. But it’s wool, not leather. A wool blend, actually. Real wool is so itchy.”

Helena laughed. Maybe it was just her active imagination, but Felicity thought she could just about smell the crazy coming off the leather-clad woman.

“Oh my God, you are precious,” said Helena. “Where on Earth did he find you?”

“Here,” Felicity replied.

“How did a nice girl like you get sucked into Oliver Queen’s toxic orbit?” Helena asked.

“There was absolutely no sucking involved,” said Felicity. “And you’re assuming I’m a nice girl. I _am_ committing a felony right now.”

“Because I’m aiming a crossbow at you. I’m sure the crimes you commit for Oliver are done with the purest of motives.”

Felicity did not like the familiar way Oliver’s name rolled off the other woman’s tongue. It was intimate in a way it shouldn’t have been, and it made Felicity want to spin in her chair and throw a punch.

“I don’t doubt you have some skill, but you’re a nice girl through and through,” Helena declared. “You have panda faces on your shoes.”

Felicity glanced down at her feet. She’d added the whimsical shoes to her blah work outfit for a desperately needed bit of fun and color. Helena’s tone implied that her choice was naïve and childish.

“Got an address yet?”

Felicity pointed at the monitor. Helena loomed over her shoulder, her warm, crazy, slightly minty breath tickling Felicity’s ear.

“Great!” Helena said brightly, straightening up. “Well done.” She grasped the back of the chair and spun it around until Felicity was facing her. “Stand up.”

“Are you going to kill me?” Felicity asked, staring at the crossbow.

Helena yanked her to her feet. “No, I don’t think so. I like the idea of Oliver knowing that no one around him is safe, even his pet I.T. girl.”

Felicity raised her hand without even thinking what she’d do with it, but Helena caught her wrist and twisted her arm behind her back in a simple one-handed move.

“Easy there, killer,” she said. “If you become a problem, I won’t hesitate to bury one of these little arrows in your chest.” Felicity stopped struggling. “I’d say your heart, but it’s obvious you’ve already lost it to Oliver.”

“You’re wrong,” Felicity said through clenched teeth as Helena bound her hands behind her back.

Helena laughed again, just a little too loud, just a little off balance. “Do you hear yourself? You can’t even say those two words with conviction.” Helena pulled on the bonds, testing them, and then turned Felicity to face her again. “I know Oliver, and I know what draws him to people. Your innocence and trust. He can shape your vision of him to suit his own needs. And you’re just a cute little computer nerd, basking in the attention from a charming billionaire.”

“You’re wrong,” Felicity said again, her voice stronger and more sure this time.

Helena laughed. She raised her crossbow so that it was pointed at the ceiling and then gave Felicity a shove. Caught off-guard, Felicity went down with no way to break her fall.

“Tell him I said hi.” Helena’s high-heeled boots made little _pock-pock_ sounds as she walked around Felicity’s desk and out of the department.

“Well, that was fun,” Felicity mumbled into the carpet. She’d hit her head on the chair or something, and her glasses had come off. Should she scream for help? No, she was alone in the office, and if anyone did come, they’d see the FBI’s database still up on her monitor.

Dig was right. Helena Bertinelli was totally psycho. Felicity had no doubt that the woman would have killed her if it suited her purposes. It was a sobering portrait of what Oliver might have become—or could still become—without Diggle and Felicity keeping him grounded.

She squirmed, trying to sit up, but she was a little dizzy from hitting her head. And without her glasses, all the office furniture was just a series of blurry, dark shapes. Maybe in a minute, when her head stopped spinning, she could try to get up and reach the phone.

Hurried footsteps sounded in the hallway. Her heart—which did _not_ belong to Oliver, no matter what Helena said—leapt into her throat.

“Felicity!”

It was just one word, her name, but every time it fell from his lips, it meant something different. This time she heard his fear, guilt, and anger all wrapped up in the four syllables she knew best.

“Oliver . . . Oliver!” Relief weakened her voice, turned it soft where she’d meant to sound forceful, or at least uninjured. She wiggled her feet, hoping he’d see her shoes and come around the desk.

“I’m here.”

In a heartbeat, he was on his knees next to her, cutting through the bonds that held her hands together. As he helped her sit up, his hand grazed her cheek and stayed there for just a moment, but it was enough to stop her breath.

“Are you okay?” he asked, looking into her eyes.

Felicity could only nod. She didn’t trust herself to speak. Oliver’s touches were complicated. Her first instinct was to purr, and her second instinct was to jump on him. Fortunately, she was pretty good at shoving those instincts into the same corner of her mind where she kept her daddy issues and the way Oliver’s head-tilt and half-smile made her skin tingle.

Dig burst in then, gun drawn. Oliver flinched and pushed Felicity behind him before he realized who it was. The action made her knees go weak, and she had to grip the edge of her desk for support. He would have taken a bullet for her just now.

“I got your call,” Dig said to Oliver. “What happened?”

“Helena.”

“She found the address to the safe house where her father’s being kept,” Felicity put in. “She made me hack the FBI database. I’m sorry, Oliver.”

“Hey.” He gave her arm a squeeze, and she squeezed back. “It’s not your fault.” Then he walked out of her reach.

“Oliver, what are you going to do?” Diggle asked.

“What I should have done in the first place,” Oliver replied. He crossed the room in two strides and disappeared down the hallway.

“Is he going to—” Felicity mimed drawing back the string on an imaginary bow.

Dig shrugged, which wasn’t really an answer.

“So now that I’ve officially met her, I’m going to go out on a limb and say there’s something wrong with that woman,” Felicity said.

“Oh, she’s crazier than a monkey on crack,” Dig said. He handed Felicity her glasses. “Anything she might have said to you . . . You know better than to believe it, right?”

Felicity nodded, settling her glasses back on her face. “It was obvious when the crazy was talking,” she began. “Everything she said about Oliver was wrong. She sees him through a lens that is completely unbalanced.” She picked up the zip ties Oliver had sliced through and tossed them in the trash.

“Everything she said about Oliver . . . what else did she say?” Dig asked.

“Her opinion of me was creepily insightful,” Felicity replied, rubbing her reddened wrists.

“Creepily.” Dig snorted.

“Shut up, it’s totally a word.” Felicity jabbed his arm. “She called me his pet,” she confessed. “And she said some other things that . . . Well, it’s stuff I try not to think about, usually.”

“Don’t take stock in any of it,” said Dig. “You are nobody’s pet. You’re a valued part of this team.”

“I’m not—” She bit her lower lip. “I’m not just a nice girl who got sucked into Oliver’s toxic orbit?”

“Oh, come on,” Diggle said, taking her arm and leading her toward the door. “If you really thought that was true, would you be here? Would I?”

Felicity shook her head. “No. I’m not an idiot.”

“Most definitely not. She rattled you, but she was talking from way on the other side of normal. You can’t take anything she said to heart.”

“Dig, you’re the best,” said Felicity, perking up a little.

“Yes, I am,” he replied. “And you can take _that_ to heart.”

They headed out to the hallway but had barely taken a step out before Felicity remembered something.

“Oh!” she cried.

“What?” asked Dig.

“It might be a good idea for me to back out of the FBI database and cover my tracks.”

“Might be,” Dig said with a chuckle.


	8. I Can't See Anything

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity stares at her hands a lot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a migraine-sufferer solidarity gift for thatmasquedgirl, who, whenever I say, "I NEED to see this on the show," replies, "You NEED to write it." So may I present to you Shirtless AND Crying Oliver, since we've already had Shirtless/Suspenders Oliver. And really, I just can't get enough of Olicity hand-holding.

**I Can’t See Anything**

“Why are all the lights off?” Felicity asked as she negotiated the steps into the Foundry. “I can’t see anything.”

“Didn’t you shut everything off when we left last night?” Diggle stepped down behind her, his hand falling on her shoulder.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t make it pitch-black like this.” She froze, her foot hovering above the next stair. “ _All_ the lights are off, Dig. All. The. Lights.”

His jacket rustled, which she knew meant he was drawing his gun. “Stay here,” he whispered in her ear.

Felicity squeezed over to let him by, then wondered what good he thought he could do with a gun in utter darkness.

It didn’t make sense. Every light was out, from the big overheads to the medical lamp, which ran on batteries, along with anything else that had lights on it, namely the computers. She strained to hear Dig’s footsteps as he descended the remaining stairs and crossed the expanse of the room. The flip of a switch echoed in the stillness, and the harsh, unflinching light from the medical lamp pierced the dark.

“Batteries,” said Dig. He gestured for her to come down the stairs. She joined him in the center of the room. “What do you think?” he asked. “Power outage? Could we have blown a fuse?”

Felicity shook her head. “Not a chance. All the power in here runs on a grid—” She waved her hand. “Never mind. There are only two ways this could have happened. Either someone turned off everything one item at a time, or someone manually tripped the circuit breaker.”

A grunt came from the back of the room, where Oliver kept the cot he’d been sleeping on since ending his relationship with his mother. Felicity met Diggle’s eyes for a brief moment, and then turned to head back that way. Dig grasped her arm, holding her back.

“Not a good idea,” he said, his voice lowered now that they knew Oliver was here, and probably asleep. “He woke up from a nightmare once with his hands around his mother’s throat.”

Felicity’s eyes widened.

“I’ll go check the circuit breaker,” said Dig. “I know you want to help, but just let him be, okay? He gets lost in the past and doesn’t know where he is. He could hurt you without realizing what he’s doing.”

He went back up the stairs. Felicity turned the lamp so the light angled toward her workstation. She sat in her chair and looked at the blank monitors. Oliver was _so_ going to get a lecture for shutting off the power to the entire basement. He was lucky she hadn’t been in the middle of any searches.

She’d gotten out her phone to play Candy Crush when she heard a strangled cry coming from Oliver’s direction. In her experience, everything that seemed loud and big in dreams was muffled and muted in reality. Oliver was probably shouting in whatever scenario was playing out in his mind.

Dig’s warning no longer seemed to matter. She entered the area in the back of the room where Oliver had set up the cot. A double. But Sara was gone, having moved in with Laurel after a huge argument with Oliver about what to do regarding Detective Lance’s arrest. She was putting all of her energy into helping her father and keeping Laurel from learning about her own identity as the Canary.

Oliver was sprawled across the cot, the blanket in an impossible tangle around his legs. He was shirtless, of course. Felicity was pretty sure she saw him _out_ of a shirt more often than she saw him in one, but the sight of him in pajama pants would have been adorable if not for the expression on his face. She’d never before seen quite that combination of horror and sorrow. And his eyes weren’t even open.

“Oliver,” she said softly.

He thrashed once and then stilled. That terrible expression remained, and she couldn’t stop the hand that reached out to smooth the creases in his forehead. Seeing her small hand and brightly painted nails in contrast to his hard, muscled edges always made her smile. When she touched him, he flinched.

“Felicity,” he murmured.

She thought for a moment he’d awoken, but his eyes were still closed, and the way he’d said her name . . . it was different. It reminded her of the way he’d said it after Helena had left her tied up at QC, but there was an added note of despair that grabbed hold of her heart and squeezed. Felicity sat on the edge of the cot. Her hand moved to his cheek and stayed there. She didn’t know what to say. What promise could she give to comfort him? She couldn’t say he was okay, because he wasn’t. She couldn’t say everything would be okay, because maybe it wouldn’t, and they didn’t lie to each other, not anymore.

The lights flickered and then came on. The electronic buzz of servers warming up was a calming melody to Felicity’s frayed nerves.  She started to get up, knowing she’d been in for a tongue-lashing, or at least a glower, from Diggle if he found her so close to Oliver in his current state, but a large, warm hand closed over her own, pulling her down.

“Stay. Please.” He was awake now, and a lump formed in her throat as she met his dark blue eyes, which were filled with unshed tears. “Just for a minute.”

She sank back onto the cot, unable to hold his gaze for long. He interlocked his fingers with hers, and she couldn’t repress the shiver that rippled through her at the contact. The gesture had always seemed intimate to her, _not_ the action of a friend. It carried more weight than that. Felicity stared down at the pattern their fingers made, tan, pale, tan, pale, his nails blunt and short, her own digits capped with a splash of blue.

“You’re here,” he mumbled.

“Yeah.” She still couldn’t look at him. “I’m out of a job now. Where else would I be?”

With his other hand, he traced her fingers clasped in his. His touch made her skin thrum. “It’s going to be okay.”

Felicity finally met his eyes. Well, not exactly. She couldn’t move her gaze any farther up than his quivering lower lip. “I thought we were done lying,” she said. “You can’t possibly know that.”

He squeezed her hand. “Yes, I can.”

“How, Oliver? Things are really, really bad.”

“It’s bad,” he agreed, swiping at his eyes with his free hand. “But _you’re_ here, and for me that takes away at least one of those ‘really’s.”


	9. I Don't Know What You Want From Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity is hot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonus prompt from thatmasquedgirl. It was originally going to be an argument, but it quickly took a fluffy turn. You can take this as AU or as happening sometime before Oliver totally checked out as CEO.

**I Don’t Know What You Want From Me**

It wasn’t fair. Felicity was never comfortable in the office. Floor-to-ceiling windows all around meant sunlight poured in constantly. If she wasn’t roasting in the sun, she was shivering in the a/c. Isabel had decried Felicity’s cardigans as not professional enough for the assistant to the CEO, but Felicity kept a plain black one in the bottom desk drawer anyway. She only ever pulled it out if she really needed it and if she knew Isabel wasn’t in the building.

The daily temperature battle was just one item on a long list of irritations, but today it chafed more than usual. The air conditioning wasn’t on since it was early spring, and Felicity’s desk was bathed in the afternoon sun. She peeked through the glass partition into Oliver’s office. He looked perfectly comfortable. He hadn’t even loosened his tie. It really wasn’t fair.

He glanced up just then and caught her eye. She’d pretty much stopped blushing every time he made eye contact with her, but the intensity of his gaze still caught her off-guard sometimes.

_What?_ he mouthed.

She shook her head.

_What?_ he mouthed again. He wore a concerned frown.

Felicity fanned herself with her hand.

Oliver arched an eyebrow.

Oh God, he probably thought she meant looking at him was  _making_ her hot, not that she was boiling in the sun. She pointed at him and shook her head, then picked up a file and fanned herself with it, pointing out the window.

Oliver shook his head. He frowned at the phone on his desk, jabbing at random buttons. Then he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his cell.

Her own mobile buzzed. She looked down at the screen.

_Intercom still broken,_ his message read.  _I don’t know what you want from me._

_Nothing!_ she texted back.  _You asked “what?” and I was just trying to tell you I’m hot._

Felicity cringed. There was absolutely no way to say that without the double meaning, not when Oliver was involved in the conversation. She refused to look up, but he wasn’t answering, so she risked a glance.

Damn. She’d expected another arched eyebrow, or at most a smirk. Instead he was full-on smiling, teeth visible and everything. She was glad she was sitting down because that rare sight tended to make her legs go all jibbly.

_You asked_ , she texted him.  _I’m roasting_ .

_I’m sorry. Is there anything I can do?_

She shrugged.

That seemed to be the end of the conversation. Oliver’s work phone rang, and he turned to answer it. All of his calls were supposed to go through her, which meant it was probably Isabel’s assistant. He was a mean little twerp when he wasn’t fawning over his boss, and he shared her contempt of Felicity.

Movement in Oliver’s office drew her attention, and she watched, fascinated, as he held the receiver to his ear with one hand and texted on his cell phone with the other. Was he ambidextrous? Could he shoot arrows with his other hand?

A while later, Dig showed up with his hands full. Felicity sat up straight and felt a trickle of sweat run down her back.

“What are you doing up here?” she asked. “I thought we agreed you’d start hanging out in the break room more because I never get any work done when you hang out in here.”

He smiled as he set a huge Styrofoam cup with a straw on her desk. “You don’t get any work done when I’m here because you don’t stop talking,” he said. “I was in the break room, but I heard you could use some cool refreshment.”

Felicity sipped on the straw. A burst of flavor and combination exploded on her tongue. She swallowed and then sighed happily. “A cherry limeade? How’d you know?”

“I didn’t,” said Dig. “Give Oliver a little credit.”

“That’s, um, observant.” She didn’t know what else to say to that. And she definitely wasn’t going to glance over at Oliver again. So she looked up at Dig instead. He was smirking.

Felicity frowned at him, but then she saw the bag he was holding. “Whatcha got there?” she asked.

“Reinforcements.” He set the bag on her desk and pulled out a package of Twizzlers, followed by a six-pack of Dr. Pepper. The cans were still cold.

Felicity let out a yodel of delight.

Dig grinned. “My work here is done,” he said. “Be sure to thank Oliver, though. It was all him. I just did the legwork.”

She leapt up from her chair and hugged him. “Thank you anyway. All this will help the rest of my day go faster.”

After Diggle left, Felicity finally let her gaze turn to the glass partition. Oliver was smiling at her. She smiled back and raised her cherry limeade toward him in a toast. She hummed happily through the rest of her afternoon, between sips of cold drinks.


	10. You're Joking, Right?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity describes her worst date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There didn't seem to be a good way to end this without killing the momentum, so it just kind of . . . ends. Anyway. phynkx on Tumblr gave me this prompt--"If you're still taking prompts, can you write about that lacrosse player that stalked Felicity in her freshman year? A mere mention will do or offhand remark perhaps." This is a little more than a mere mention, and it's a bit spec-fic, as I have it set in or following 2x19, based on the fight scene in the Foundry and the pic released of Sara with a brace on her wrist. Enjoy!

**You’re Joking, Right?**

 

Oliver paced. The ER doctor was a hardass who adamantly refused to let him accompany Sara into the examination room. He’d been ready to punch the little man, but then he felt the pressure of a hand on his arm.

“Come with me,” Felicity whispered to him.

He’d let her pull him away, leading him to a chair in the waiting area. But immediately after sitting, he popped up and began to pace the floor. They’d all been hurt in the ambush, except for Felicity, but Sara’s wrist was an injury they didn’t have the capability to deal with in the Foundry. So Diggle sat, and Felicity tapped on her tablet, and Oliver paced, half-listening to their murmured conversation.

“What are you doing?” Diggle asked her. “Playing Candy Crush or Googling the cost of X-ray machines?”

“Neither,” she replied. “I’m feasting on the corpses of my enemies.”

Oliver stopped in his tracks.

“You’re joking, right?” said Dig.

“Do I look like I’m eating?” she snapped. “Of course I’m joking.”

Felicity looked up and met Dig’s eyes under arched brows. “Sorry,” she said. “That was rude.”

Dig squeezed her arm. “It’s okay. We’re all on edge.”

“To answer your question, I’m too wound up for Candy Crush, and Oliver already shot down the X-ray machine idea.”

“Of course he did,” Dig said with a smile.

Oliver changed the course of his pacing to pass closer by them.

“I’m  _figuratively_ feasting on the corpses of my enemies,” said Felicity. “When I need to be cheered up, I watch cat videos on YouTube. And when that doesn’t work, I look up Jeff.”

“Who’s Jeff?” Dig asked.

Felicity tilted the tablet toward Diggle so he could see the screen.

“Oh. The lacrosse player, right?”

“Turns out our girl had a life before she met us. Imagine that,” Dig said with a twinkle in his eye. “Chewed that boy up and spit him right back out.”

“Oh, please,” Felicity scoffed.

Oliver looked down at her tablet. It showed a Facebook photo of a kid about Roy’s age. He was pale and underfed-looking, with a knobby Adam’s apple and shaggy brown hair.

“This guy played lacrosse? And you dated him?” Oliver said, incredulous.

“MIT is not renowned for their sports prowess,” Felicity replied. “And it was one date. The worst one I’ve ever had.”

"Oh, really,” said Dig. “I think we need to hear this story.”

“Ugh, it was horrible,” she said, waving her hand and dropping her tablet in her lap. “Every bad-date cliché you can think of.”

“Uh oh. Did he make you pay?”

“We split the check,” said Felicity. “And he had a coupon.” She glanced up at Oliver. “I’ll explain what that is some other time.”

“I know what a coupon is,” he muttered.

“But wait, there’s more,” she said. “Jeff chewed with his mouth open.”

“Sorry, Felicity, but every eighteen- or nineteen-year-old boy does that,” Dig pointed out.

“On a date, really?” She shook her head. “Anyway, it was one of those deals where you get an appetizer, an entrée,  _and_ dessert, so I spent three courses watching him masticate instead of eating my own dinner because I’d totally lost my appetite during the appetizer.”

“Why the appetizer?” Oliver asked.

“It was spinach artichoke dip,” Felicity said. “So while we waited for the entrées, I got to watch him pick spinach out of his teeth. But that’s not even the worst part.”

“How could it get worse?” said Diggle.

“Well, I forgot to mention that he didn’t hold open any doors for me. It was really making me mad. I mean, I’m a feminist, and women should be equal to men, but there’s also such a thing as common courtesy, you know?” Felicity was waving her hands around, alternately looking at Dig and then Oliver. She always told stories like this, animated and inclusive of her audience.

“Anyway, I may have said something to that effect,” she continued. “And Jeff said something snide right back, something about not wanting to impinge on my growth as a strong, independent woman, like he would know anything about that. So. No door-opening. But the worst, the absolute worst, was when we walked back to my dorm—”

“You walked?” Oliver asked. “He didn’t pick you up?”

“We went to Applebee’s. It was just down the street.”

Oliver frowned. Applebee’s was not a restaurant he was familiar with.

“So we walked back to my dorm,” Felicity went on, “and Jeff was all ‘I had a nice time,’ and I was like, ‘Whatever, dude. I’m sure you did, since you ate like a pig and talked about yourself  _at the same time_ .’ He’d laugh and food flecks would spray all over the table. It was so gross. But anyway, he said he had a nice time, and he leaned in and I was thinking, ‘Oh God, he wants to  _kiss_ me with that mouth.’”

Dig was laughing now, and Oliver felt a smile rise up unbidden on his own face.

“I was so busy freaking out that I didn’t have a chance to back away, just to turn my head, so when he kissed me, his lips landed on my neck. And he  _slobbered_ .” She shuddered.

“And then he spent the rest of the semester outside your dorm, pining?” Dig asked.

“Not the whole semester, but it did take Jeff a few weeks to realize that when I said I’d never go out with him again, I actually meant it. He decorated my car for our two-week anniversary. First, that’s creepy. Two weeks? Second, we weren’t even dating!”

“Doesn’t sound that bright,” Diggle said. “How’d he get into MIT?”

“Daddy’s money,” Felicity replied. “No offense,” she said to Oliver.

He shrugged. “How exactly does reliving your worst date cheer you up?”

“It’s not that. It’s where he is now. I know it’s petty of me, schadenfreude and all that—”

_When_ did she start speaking German?

"But it makes me feel better. Here.” Felicity tapped on her tablet, and another photo popped up.

It was the same guy, only older, with a marginally better haircut. Marginally. He still looked as if he wasn’t eating much. How could a guy like that get onto a lacrosse team? How could a guy like that consider himself in the same league as Felicity?

“You didn’t mean to say that out loud, did you?” she asked. “Or are you going to start referring to all of us in third person now?” Before he could answer, she waved him off, shaking her head. “So Jeff is currently unemployed. So am I, actually, but I have a cool night job. Jeff, on the other hand, got himself fired from a cushy job at Apple because apparently even Daddy’s money can’t save your neck when you leave the latest iPhone prototype at a skeevy bar.”


	11. I Want to Help

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity gets a roommate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote most of this before last night's ep aired. We all had a lot of feeeeeelings after 2x20, and I've read a lot of one-shots/drabbles about it. This is just my take on how it could have ended.

**I Want to Help—post 2x20**

It was all a mess. Everyone was a mess. Oliver was dealing with the cops and funeral arrangements. Thea had been sedated because she was hysterical. Diggle was at the lair, baby-sitting an unconscious Roy. Felicity had been with him, but there was nothing she could do for Roy or Thea or Oliver, and it was driving her crazy. So she grabbed her jacket and her purse and left the relatively safe location of Verdant, venturing deeper into the Glades than she'd ever been.

The clock tower Sara had made her home when she first came back to Starling City wasn't a secret. There'd been enough fights there that Felicity was surprised the cops hadn't tried staking it out to catch the Arrow and/or the Canary. Of course the elevator didn't work. The building was technically condemned, but no one had gotten around to turning it into a parking lot yet.

Felicity stuck her foot out, wishing she'd worn flats. The bottom stair seemed stable enough, so she took another step and bounced a little to see how it would take her weight.

"So far, so good," she muttered.

She made her way up the stairs and stepped out into a large room. Scaffolding was evident here and there, and plastic sheeting hung from the walls, but it was clear that whatever the renovation project was, it had been abandoned a long time ago.

"If you're looking for the Canary, don't bother."

Felicity shrieked.

Sin ducked around a piece of plastic sheeting and approached her. "She took off," she said.

The girl still sported the bruise that Roy had given her, and with her usually spiky hair flattened and a Spongebob blanket draped over her shoulders, she looked much younger than eighteen.

"I'm not actually looking for Sar—I mean, the Canary," said Felicity.

"No need to lie, since you clearly suck at it," Sin said. She sounded congested. "I know who you are and that you know Sara's the Canary. You're the Arrow's girl."

"I'm not his girl," Felicity replied. "I mean, I am in the sense that I work with him, but I'm not his  _girl_  girl. Sara's his girl. Well, she was, until she broke up with him right before she left. And oh my God, I basically just told you who the Arrow is." She sank down on a nearby box, putting her head in her hands.

"Oh please, like that's a big mystery."

Felicity looked up. "Did Sara tell you?"

"No. I knew she knew who it was, and I bugged her about it for a while, but she'd just say it wasn't her secret to tell."

"Then how do you know?"

Sin rolled her eyes. "A hood and a tiny little mask? It's not much of a disguise. Anyone who's paying attention could figure it out, but most people aren't paying attention. They're too busy being all 'Agh! It's the Arrow!'" Her voice cracked on the last word. "Look, I've known for a while and I haven't said anything, so you don't have to worry about me."

"But I  _am_  worried about you," said Felicity. "That's why I'm here. I want to help. Since Sara's taken off, someone needs to keep tabs on you while we wait on a cure for Roy. He's sedated right now, but the stuff we're giving him—It's strong stuff, but there isn't an unlimited supply. When he's awake, he seems to be going after the people he cares about."

"Aw, that's sweet. And incredibly messed up." Sin began to cough . . . and cough, and cough.

Felicity brought forth a bottle of water from the depths of her voluminous tote bag and handed it to Sin.

"So," she began as the girl drank, "I'm Felicity Smoak, vigilante tech support. And you're coming home with me."

Sin did a spit-take, spraying out the water she'd just sipped. " _What?_ "

"You're coming home with me. Are you really going to make me argue about this? Because arguing will just make me grumpy, and I'll win anyway."

"You think so?" Sin asked, wiping her chin on her sleeve.

"Absolutely," Felicity replied. "I know you've been squatting here since you met up with Sara. But are you really going to turn down the chance to stay somewhere tonight with running water and a fridge?"

"I have a fridge." Sin nodded toward the far corner, where Felicity could see attempts had been made to make the place more livable. A hot plate and a mini-fridge were hooked up to a heavy-duty extension cord. There were also two cots strewn with blankets, but Felicity knew Sara hadn't been sleeping there since she'd hooked up with Oliver again.

"But my fridge has booze in it . . . which you will not have because you're obviously underage. It also has a freezer fully stocked with ice cream. I have an intimate relationship with Ben & Jerry's. Not sexy intimate, just yummy intimate."

Sin scoffed in what might have been a cynical approximation of a laugh.

"Running water, seriously," Felicity said. "What could be a bigger selling point than that? Plus, you're sick. You should be getting rest somewhere that's less ventilated." She eyed one of the holes in the ceiling.

The young girl sighed heavily. Felicity took it as a sigh of acquiescence. Sin tossed the Spongebob blanket aside and put on a black leather jacket, then headed for the stairs.

"I'm not a stray puppy, you know," she said as she walked past Felicity. "I was the kind of kid that got kicked out of foster homes."

Felicity followed her down the stairs. "Is that supposed to intimidate me? Because I work with vigilantes, and I'm not afraid of them . . . Well, maybe I'm a little afraid of Sara sometimes."

Sin laughed, a real one this time.

"So what kind of car do you drive?" Sin asked once they were outside. She glanced up and down the street. "Pink plastic convertible?"

"Should you be cracking a Barbie joke?" Felicity retorted. "Doesn't it hurt your street cred?"

"Nah, you're too small. More like Skipper than Barbie."

When they reached Felicity's red Mini, Sin was coughing too hard to make any sarcastic comments. Felicity tried to picture the contents of her medicine cabinet and then decided a run to the store was in order. Sin grumbled, but Felicity made her come with her into the open-all-night drugstore.

"I wouldn't jack your car," Sin said. "I wouldn't be caught dead behind the wheel of that little roller skate."

"I'm not worried about you stealing my car," Felicity replied as they entered the store. "I just don't want you out on the street by yourself with a huge target on your back."

Later, on the steps in front of her townhome, Felicity juggled her tote and the shopping bags, trying to unlock the door. She dropped the keys. Sin picked them up.

"You could ask me to help, you know," Sin said as she fitted the key into the lock. "I have a cold, not hooks for hands."

"I'll remember that," Felicity said.

Once inside, Sin seemed uncomfortable, though Felicity could tell she was trying not to show it.

"It's either my place or the Queen mansion," Felicity told her. "Those are your only options. That mansion is creepy and fancy and intimidating, and my place isn't."

"Well, you do have all the cold medicine and the ice cream."

Sin followed her down the hallway and into the kitchen. Felicity set the bags on the counter and pulled out the decongestant and the cough syrup she'd bought.

"Do you have a fever too?" Felicity asked, leaning toward the girl. "I have plenty of Tylenol."

Sin dodged her. "I swear to God, Skipper, if you feel my forehead, I will bite off your hand."

Felicity narrowed her eyes. "You're a really bad patient. But lucky for you, that's the only kind I have experience with." She measured out a dose of cough syrup and handed the little plastic cup to Sin, who tossed it back in one swallow. Then she popped two pills out of a blister pack and gave those to Sin with a glass of water.

Felicity didn't feel like having ice cream anymore. She wanted something warm and comforting, so she made coffee, filling her biggest mug.

"So is this the part where we have a heartfelt, musically accompanied conversation where I tell you my story and you tell me yours, and then there's crying and hugging?" Sin asked.

"I don't really do sitcom moments," Felicity said. "And I already know your story. Well, most of it. Once you fell off the grid after that last foster home, all I had to go on were police reports."

"How'd you get hold of police reports?" Sin asked.

"Easily. I first hacked their system when I was twelve, and I put in a back door in case I ever needed to get in again. Of course I had no idea that I'd eventually hook up with a leather-clad vigilante and practically make the SCPD's servers my second home."

"You're a little scary yourself there," said Sin.

"Thanks." Felicity beamed. She pulled a carton of ice cream out of the freezer—Chocolate Peppermint Crunch—and a spoon and shoved them toward Sin. "Enjoy," she told the girl. "I'm going to change into my comfy clothes."

Felicity had stopped at the bottom of the stairs to take off her heels when she heard Sin cough loudly. It turned into a long coughing fit that worried Felicity enough to return barefoot to the kitchen.

Sin leaned against the counter. "I just had one bite," she said when the coughing had tapered off. "I guess maybe it wasn't such a good idea. Which sucks because this is really good." She dropped the spoon on the counter.

Felicity put the lid back on the ice cream and returned it to the freezer. "It'll still be here tomorrow," she said. "You should go to bed."

Upstairs, she found some clothes that Sin deemed acceptable for sleeping purposes—cotton pajama pants and a gray MIT sweatshirt. She set up the younger girl in the guest room, with a glass of water and an array of medicines on the night stand.

"Do you have a fever?" Felicity asked. "I don't have a thermometer, so there's no way to know for sure, but I do have Tylenol here too," she said, pointing to one of the medicine bottles.

Sin rolled her eyes. "You already asked me that, and you mentioned the Tylenol too."

"Well, it's there if you need it," Felicity replied. "I'll be right across the hall."

"Okay,  _Mom_ ," said Sin, one side of her mouth quirking up. "Big Sis. Aunt Felicity."

"I liked it better when you were calling me Skipper. Or I disliked it less."

It took Felicity a long time to get ready for bed, between constantly checking her phone for messages from Oliver and peeking in on Sin twice—" _You're going to come in here in the middle of the night to see if I'm still breathing, aren't you?_ " When she came out of the bathroom after brushing her teeth, she found Sin curled up on the foot of her bed, wrapped in a fuzzy pink blanket and snoring softly. Felicity snapped a photo with her phone. As she was admiring what was sure to be future blackmail material, her phone buzzed with an incoming text.

_Everything okay?_  Oliver asked.

_Fine_ , Felicity typed back.  _I'm the one who should be asking you that._

_Just wanted to check in before you go to sleep. You ARE going to sleep, right?_

_Yeah, soon. You?_

_Probably not._

_Well, take Sin's example and give it a try anyway._  Felicity sent him the photo.

_Taking in strays now?_  Oliver asked.

_Someone has to. Might as well be me._

_You are amazing._

Felicity smiled as she typed her reply.  _Don't you mean remarkable?_


	12. Four in One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Felicity is not the most awkward person in the room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm a little weary of these prompts right now, honestly. I just haven't been coming up with many ideas. So I decided to try my hand at writing Barry, and to see how many of the prompts I could fit into one conversation. This contains four: "How did that happen," "Tell me the truth," "That doesn't make any sense," and "We make a good team." I probably could have squeezed in at least two more, but I think I ended it at a good spot. I do feel like it's a little OOC because I don't think Felicity actually picked up on any jealousy Oliver might have had. I think she thought he was just being a jerk to the new kid. Also, special thanks to redrose86/faithfire for giving me the right word at the right time so that I didn't end up saying "awkward" about 87 bajillion times in this short scene.

**Just Dance—missing scene 2x08**

Felicity was not enjoying herself. Not even a little bit. The big welcome-home gala turned awkward little cocktail party at the Queen mansion was, well, awkward. And little. There wasn’t enough of a crowd for her to get lost in. She was driving, so she couldn’t avail herself of the open bar. Isabel Rochev was lurking nearby, and to make matters worse, Felicity started looking around at the other women and wondering if her hair was too casual for her dress. When Oliver murmured something in her ear about dancing, her first instinct was to elbow him in the gut. He was just lucky she was good at shutting down her instincts when she needed to.

But then he said he called Barry. He’d sucked up his stupid pride and called Barry. Barry, grinning adorably in the doorway of the ballroom, wearing a suit that didn’t quite fit. It was close, but the sleeves were a bit short and the pants were a touch too long.

“Hello, invited guest,” he said when he reached her. “Your plus-one was able to make it after all.”

Felicity took his hand. “Hello, plus-one. Shall we?”

It was a little weird at first because there was only one other couple dancing. They were older and gray-haired and had been slowly waltzing in the same corner all evening. But with Barry in front of her and her back to the rest of the room, she started to relax.

“Um. Is this a bad time to tell you I really suck at dancing?”

“These are slow dances,” Felicity said with a smile. “All we have to do is sway and maybe, if we’re feeling ambitious, move around in a circle.”

Barry grinned. “I think I can handle that without too much stepping on your feet.”

Felicity looked down. The long skirt of her bright pink dress mostly hid her feet, which was a shame because her shoes were really cute. So were Barry’s, in a totally different way. The toes of his Converse sneakers peeked out from the overlong pant cuffs bagging at his ankles.

“Nice shoes,” she said.

She’d meant it as a compliment, but he looked sheepish.

“The suit’s a loaner,” he explained. “It didn’t come with shoes.”

“I like them,” she assured him. “I kind of feel like I’m dancing with the Doctor.”

“You mean Ten, obviously.”

“Obviously,” she said, still looking at his feet. “It’s a relief to not have to explain.”

“Oh, I know what you mean,” said Barry. “I have to explain  _Doctor Who_ references to Iris all the time. I think I turned her off from it for good just because I talk about it so much.”

“Who’s Iris?” Felicity asked, glancing up. She tried to make it sound innocent and genuinely curious, but on the inside she was praying it was a sister.

Barry sighed. “She’s kind of the Doctor to my Martha Jones. There might be some pining on my part from time to time.”

“Oh. But not on her part?”

“No, hence the comparison. But Martha had the sense to walk away. I haven’t worked up the nerve yet.”

Their closeness seemed uncomfortable now, and Felicity found the temptation to rest her head on his shoulder a little easier to ignore.

You’re here,” she said. “That’s a step, isn’t it?”

He shrugged. He’d taken her advice to heart and had moved them around so that now she was facing the room. She looked past Barry’s shoulder and right into the eyes of Oliver Queen, who was glowering. She frowned right back. He was being unreasonable and overprotective and annoying, and she really shouldn’t be admiring the look of him in a tux while she was dancing with someone else.

“So,” Barry began, snapping her attention back to him, “you’re a bona fide computer genius, right? But you’re a CEO’s assistant. That’s a really high up position, but it’s not computer genius-y. How did that happen?”

“Oliver needed someone he could trust,” she replied. “We make a good team.”

Barry’s hand at her waist dropped to her hip and pulled her a little closer. He seemed more relaxed now, which made Felicity wonder if Oliver had been scowling at him the whole time her back was turned.

“I guess it makes sense.” He cocked his head. “No, wait . . . that doesn’t make any sense. I can’t imagine a job like that makes much use of your talent.”

She shrugged. The action jostled his hand, which dropped even lower, grazing the top of her thigh. He stared at the hand as if it had moved of its own accord, then settled it at the small of her back, a place less likely to make him blush.

Oliver looked ready to leap across the room and show Barry just how much torque was needed to snap someone’s neck, but then his mother stepped in front of him, blocking his view.

Felicity cleared her throat. “Well, yeah, the most I do with a computer at the office is making dinner reservations and scheduling meetings. But there are other . . . avenues.”

Barry’s eyebrows shot up, but there was a twinkle in his eyes. “Are they shady avenues, or well-lit ones? Tell me the truth.”

Felicity didn’t answer. She just flashed a brilliant smile at Barry, making sure Oliver could see it.


End file.
